General Scott | Page 6

advice of his friend, the distinguished lawyer and statesman, Benjamin Watkins Leigh, he devoted himself to the study of military works and of English attack. During the time mentioned he wrote a letter to Lewis Edwards, Esq., at Washington City, of which he following is a copy:
"PETERSBURG, _June, 1811_.
"DEAR SIR: I believe we have very little village news to give you, nor do I know what would please you in that way. Of myself--that person who has so large a space in every man's own imagination, and so small a one in the imagination of every other--I can say but little; perhaps less would please you more. Since my return to Virginia my time has been passed in easy transitions from pleasure, to study, from study to pleasure; in my gayety forgetting the student, in the student forgetting my gayety.[A] I have generally been in the office of my friend Mr. Leigh, though not unmindful of the studies connected with my present profession; but you will easily conceive my military ardor has suffered abatement. Indeed, it is my design, as soon as circumstances will permit, to throw the feather out of my cap and resume it in my hand. Yet, should war come at last, my enthusiasm will be rekindled, and then who knows but that I may yet write my history with my sword?
"Yours truly,
"WINFIELD SCOTT."
[Footnote A: "If idle, be not solitary; if solitary, be not idle." An apothegm of Burton paraphrased by Johnson, "My Motto."]
Scott rejoined the army at Baton Rouge, La., in 1811, and was soon appointed Judge Advocate on the trial of a colonel charged with gross negligence in discipline and administration. By dilatory pleas this officer had several times escaped justice, but on this trial he was found guilty and censured. In the winter of 1811-'12 Scott was frequently on staff duty with General Wade Hampton at New Orleans, and while there saw the first steam vessel that ever floated on the Mississippi.
On May 20, 1812, Captain Scott embarked at New Orleans for Washington via Baltimore, accompanying General Hampton and Lieutenant Charles K. Gardner. As the vessel on which they had taken passage entered near the Capes of Virginia it passed a British frigate lying off the bar. In a short time they met a Hampton pilot boat going out to sea. This was on June 29th, and this pilot boat bore dispatches to Mr. Mansfield, the British Minister at Washington, announcing that Congress had two days before declared war against Great Britain. The vessel bearing Captain Scott and his companions went aground about sixteen miles from Baltimore, and he and some others undertook the remainder of the journey on foot. At the end of the fourth mile they passed an enthusiastic militia meeting which had just received a copy of the declaration of war. Scott, having on a uniform, was made the hero of the occasion, and was chosen to read the declaration to the meeting. He was here offered a seat in a double gig to Baltimore, but the driver, who had become intoxicated, overturned the gig twice, when Scott took the reins and drove the latter part of the journey. On his arrival at Baltimore he received the pleasing intelligence that he had been appointed a lieutenant colonel in the United States army. He was then in his twenty-sixth year.
He went with General Hampton to Washington, where the general asked him to accompany him on an official visit to the Secretary of War. An unpleasant correspondence had a short time previously occurred between the general and the secretary, yet he felt it his duty to make the call. On General Hampton's name being announced to the secretary the latter appeared at the door and extended his hand, while General Hampton simply bowed and crossed his hands behind him. A conversation on official matters was held, at first formal and cold, but gradually terminating in one of a friendly character. When General Hampton rose to leave he extended to the secretary both of his hands; but it was now the latter's turn, and he bowed and placed his hands behind him. General Hampton sent a challenge to mortal combat, but mutual friends settled the matter without bloodshed, by requiring that Hampton should on the next morning present himself at the secretary's door with both hands extended in the presence of the same persons who witnessed the former meeting. Colonel Scott was now ordered to Philadelphia to mobilize his regiment and organize a camp of instruction. On his own solicitation, he was soon afterward ordered to report to Brigadier-General Alexander Smyth, near Buffalo, N.Y.
[Illustration: The NIAGARA FRONTIER]
The Congress of the United States made formal declaration of war against Great Britain and its dependencies June 18, 1812. In the month previous General William Hull had